Well, it seems the Wall Street Protests are finally getting some traction and there is going to be a march and “occupation” here in Houston (http://occupyhouston.org/). It’s an interesting amorphous grass roots movement that’s inspired by the Arab Spring demonstrations with a worthwhile target.
For some reason the movement does get portrayed as liberal - that may have to do with the youth culture of the right vs the left and how they see themselves and how they are seen in the media – but I think corporate corruption isn’t a liberal agenda. Remember McCain-Feingold? John McCain back in 2000 (before he became a weirdo robot) was very aggressive with campaign finance reform. Look no further than the bail outs and the stimulus. The partisan left bitched about Bush’s bail-outs and the partisan Right bitched about Obama’s stimulus, and the rest of us just wanted some accountability. And the whole thing just comes across as crony capitalism when you read sentences like, “One of Obama’s top economic advisers confided in a 2009 e-mail that the government did a “crappy” job as a venture capitalist, picking which companies should receive financial support.”(1) But regardless of the broad message and the local organizers writing that their “political and social beliefs will remain neutral for this cause” and that “the only thing [they] will promote openly is peaceful demonstrations,” I suspect it will be mostly folks on the left or left leaning who will show up to the Houston protest.
But outside what’s behind the protest and who will be attending, I think one of the more interesting aspects is how broad and leaderless it is. That can be a double edged sword. One the one hand the lack of a cohesive message and specific proposed solutions can just come off as an aimless bitch session. On the other hand, as a message to lawmakers to address the issue, it’s quite open and democratic in its approach.
Another double edged sword is the lack of an proper and cohesive organization that can make for a clouded and muddled message. A reporter can go to one person and get a statement then go to another and get something else. But that also has an advantage in that it addresses the largest problem I saw in the local peace movement – egotistical self-righteous assholes.
I will tell you right now, I’m no fan of some of the local big wigs in the political left who seem to be more about self-aggrandizement than what is best for their cause so it’s nice to see them passed over simply becasue of the manner in which this was organized. No doubt those guys will try to get their paws into this so they can speak loudly and pound their chest but, for the moment, the movement it’s pretty safe from their bullshit. As far as I can tell, it’s basically a big ass picnic down a city hall and that’s cool because nobody wants to hear the Communist Party guys yammer on for an hour at a rally or cringe while someone starts-in with “those Jews.” I’ve seen both and trust me, that kind of shit will suck the life out of any rally which is why I loved it when, at a march I once attended, the Anarchist kids responded with their own chant “Workers of the world…RELAX!” Brilliant!
How will it go? Who knows. It looks to be a peaceful sit-in and march with good intentions. Sure it has its flaws but those flaws also help in avoiding some of the pitfalls that other local movements have been burdened by. So, while I can’t make the rally, I’m gonna give it a proper shake and give it up to the kids organizing this. Good luck.
(1) http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/10/03/BU9V1LCRSL.DTL#ixzz1ZoxRirvj
I think “amorphous” is the most appropriate description here. What exactly are these people protesting against? Banks? Wall Street? Hair loss? Not enough cheese on their sub sandwich? The Arab protesters had faced years upon years of murderous oppression. They stood up to bullets and tear gas, tanks and bombs. This movement looks to be comprised of the spoiled children of the people who built the institutions that they are now protesting against – despite having lived off them like parasites for years until the three ring circus stopped. Now they want their “stuff”. The only comparison between this and the Arab Spring is that both of them used Facebook.
I predict a collective shrug from the big, bad establishment. Besides the usual commie d-bags and professional activists you described, some dope dealers and a handful bored college kids trying to get laid, I would expect maybe half a dozen people will show up. Yes, the banks fucked everyone over. What else is new? If you want to do something about it, join a credit union. Save your own money to buy things instead of borrowing it on credit cards. Get a fucking job doing something productive that actually makes or builds or repairs something, instead of spending 6 years in college studying sociology and then getting angry because there isn’t a 6 figure job in a plush office with fat benefits waiting for you when you get out. But railing against the “system” that has fed, clothed, protected and educated your spoiled ass since the day you were born is a complete waste of time. But then I suppose time is cheap for most of these activist types.
Ok. Had to get the old-man rant off my chest. If anyone wants a piece of me, I’ll be wearing my dickies and hosing down my driveway.
Yo, old man on the driveway. Put on some reading glasses, yo. I wasn’t ( and neither would the folks at these protests) compare the Wall Street protests to the Arab Spring protests. I simply suggested that one drew inspiration from the other.
As for what they are protesting?
I think corporate corruption is a big pie and they are kind of just making a broad statement that this needs to be addressed. Again, that lack of focus is a double edged sword – it’s hard to pin down a blob and find solutions there but at the same time it also prevents any person from appointing himself a defacto mouth piece. If they did have a specific platform it would be taken over by the usual band of political assbags. I’ll take an amorphous blob any day over the usual band of blowhards like Bob Buzzanco, Ken Freeland, and Eddie Johnston. Tell you what, I’ll offer you an option. A “movement” led by those three guys vs. this the “occupy ____” folks. Yeah, you could go with the trio and yes, you will have a lot in the way of specifics and proposals but you will also want to put a gun to your head to end it all.
Well if these people “drew inspiration” from the Arab Spring, that’s pretty weak.
Unemployed Hipster: “Wow, like, I can’t get a job cos of my tats and my tongue piercing. Now I can’t afford new Doc Martens and I maxed out my credit cards! Fuckin’ corporate a-holes!”
Arab youth: “Wow, like, my whole family was shot and thrown in a mass grave.”
That’s reductionist and stupid. So, what you are saying is that if you see youth in another country gather together peacefully to change their society for the better, you should do nothing to try to improve your country?
Was John Paul Stevens just a spoiled rich kid brat when he wrote, “”The court’s ruling threatens to undermine the integrity of elected institutions around the nation” in his 90-page dissent in the McCain Feingold case?
Is Kinky Freidman a pussy when he says, “I don’t care much about big corporations, frankly. Most politicians never met a special-interest group they didn’t like.”
Stop thinking of it as left right: I think there are a lot of themes here that go beyond the standard left and right contruct.
Ultimately as Walt Kelly put it – the enemy is us. We put money blindly into our 401Ks and all we care about is that they go up in value. We ultimately are driving these companies to just care about the bottom line.
But let me ask you this Mr. Red, White, and Blue. As these companies and their stock holders become more and more international how does that affect the good of the country? Let me give you one that hits close to home – Beer!
Oh yes, Texas House Bill 602 would have Allowed small brewers to provide a limited amount of beer to consumers for off-premise consumption at the conclusion of a tour. Fucking cool right?
Who would be against something so innocuous? Why the good folks at Anheuser-Busch of course. Yes, Texas and American citizens voices didn’t matter. No instead InBev, a Belgium-based conglomerate, had the influence and connections to stop this.
Wait why woulk a foreign-owned corporation have a say in the politics of Texas Beer? Well, InBev is a person with free speech rights and, of course, the constitution has always allowed Belgians to vote in our elections. So, why shouldn’t they decide the fate of this boon to small breweries.
So thank you InBev and thank you Aging Scenester.
I maintain that it’s disproportionate and misleading to compare the disaffected youth of our fat, soft, lazy republic with the disaffected youth of totalitarian dictatorships who are putting their lives at stake to fight them. It lends this “occupation” an air of moral authority that it clearly does not deserve. It’s the same kind of hyperbole that Glenn Beck uses when he compares Obama to Hitler or Stalin.
I know all about HB 602. John Whitmire (a Democrat) colluded with Dewhurst (a Republican) to torpedo the bill on an amendment procedure. My guess is that InBev could find a way to get those two sleazeballs as much cash, dope and hookers as they wanted, Citizens United or not.
Brock Wagner of St. Arnolds, who was one of the main proponents of HB 602, said it best: “We just got outgunned”. In other words, it’s not about money in politics. It’s about who has *more* money in politics. Longer term though, I’d put my money on Brock. He’s smart, and determined, and he has fairness on his side. Regardless, the big brewers are losing market share and mindshare every day, and these kinds of tactics ultimately will backfire on them. You can only make an inferior product for so long, no matter how smart your ad men or lawyers are. Well, unless you live in a centrally controlled economy, which we may well be on our way towards.
So I’m not here to carry water for multinational corporations. I’m just suggesting that there are more effective, and constructive, ways to combat them than by holding vague protests that make you look uninformed, naive, and childish. One way is to adopt personal habits that allow you some degree of independence from them. That’s why I suggested that simply avoiding consumer debt will hurt the banks a lot more than attending some bogus protest against economic institutions the would-be protester probably can’t even begin to comprehend anyway. But doing that is harder than going to a protest, and it won’t get you laid or score you some righteous ‘dro, or get you on TV.
Why on earth would you assume the bankers’ kids are the ones out there? That makes no sense whatsoever. And I love when people are told “get a job” when 15% or whatever of the country is out of work. As if there are millions of jobs available out there, but people just don’t want to work or something. And the fact of the matter is that this crisis is in large part due to inadequate laws and inadequate enforcement of existing laws, both of which are better addressed by protest than by joining a credit union and calling it a day.
Ghost — you are taking me too literally. What I meant by “spoiled children of the people who built the institutions…” was the children of the broad upper middle class made possible by the existence of a large, capitalist oligarchy/bureaucracy that employs the majority of that upper middle class, either directly or indirectly.
I stand by my statement that people can find work, especially if they have a useful trade or skill. It is certainly harder now than it has been in a while, but if you really believe that a platform with more regulation and higher taxes (as outlined in your post below) is going to create jobs for anyone other than government workers, well there’s probably not much I can say to convince you otherwise. I do agree that corporations have too much power, but increasing regulation actually only helps them, because generally their lobbyists and lawyers are writing the regulations anyway. This makes regulation a convenient platform for eliminating nasty competitors, which only strengthens and consolidates established corporate powers. That puts downward pressure on employment, because smaller, new firms are generally the greatest source of job creation, while large corporate oligarchies grow more slowly and can easily outsource/offshore.
In general, the U.S. government *has* to be viewed as an arm of the corporate oligarchy, not an independent or impartial arbiter of the people’s interest. The failure to understand this basic fact is one reason why I have lost patience arguing with liberal Democrats over the years, despite the ongoing, endless parade of government officials and regulators being bought and sold like cattle at auction. This will never, ever change, as long as the Stars and Stripes waves over our fair land, no matter how many 20-odd year old sociology majors wander downtown to smoke a bowl and hit on hippie chicks. Not that there’s ANYTHING wrong with that –
I would hate for you not to be able to blame the unemployed for their misfortune, but the basic tenets of logic dictate that when the number of jobs available is less than the number of job seekers, not everyone will be able to find a job, regardless of their efforts or abilities. The irresponsible gambling of an out of control financial industry lead to massive job vaporization once the shit finally hit the fan. I find it very strange under these circumstances to blame the victims rather than the perpetrators.
I find your statements about regulations a bit bizarre. Look, regulations are just laws designed to ensure people/companies behave. There’s such a thing as bad regulations, good regulations, too much regulation, or too little regulation. After the Great Depression, a number of regulations were put in place to ensure the financial industry behaved, to avoid them collapsing the economy again. This worked well for a while, until Reagan and subsequent administrations increasingly deregulated the financial sector. Additionally, newly invented complex financial instruments that didn’t exist during the Depression have gone unregulated. This lead to the S&L crisis and now to our present quandary, with a broken economy, tons of jobs vaporized, tons of people foreclosed on, etc. I think it’s pretty clear at this point to everyone not blinded by their own ideologies that we need to re-regulate the financial industry to a meaningful degree if we want to avoid or diminish the impact of future crises.
I’m not trying to blame the unemployed — but I will say that in hard times, enterprising people usually find a way. I think that we probably share a desire for the same end result – productive job opportunities for everyone who wants to have one – but we disagree about the means in pretty important ways.
Most people need a dialogue to explain what happened over the last few years, and your version is similar to the standard left-Democrat one. The standard right-Republican one is that it was caused by excessive or co-opted regulation and various attempts by central planner types to tinker with the economy, and I’ve pretty much stuck with that one. Both dialogues have significant weaknesses and probably avoid the real problems with our country. Decline looks different to different people, I suppose, but once the barbarians break through the gates, it probably won’t matter very much who was right.
I still stand by my statement that in the modern era, regulations are most often designed by the industries they are intended to regulate. In some cases, these regulations may be beneficial, but broadly, they have the effect of creating barriers to entry for competition by smaller firms. They create de-facto industry cartels, whose members rotate in and out between jobs as government officials, industry consultants, and lobbyists. Most congressmen aren’t smart enough to shuck a tamale before they eat it, much less navigate complex, highly technical industries through the existing morass of federal laws and regulations while appeasing various interest groups. Thus, they lend an ear to lobbyists for those industries, and draft their lawyers into the process. The regulations get signed into law, the firms they regulate say to Congress, “O Please Brer Wolf, don’t throw me in that there briar patch!” and the interest groups walk away with a shrug or a sigh, saying, “We *think* we got something…?”
This is what modern capitalism looks like, unfortunately. Both parties bear their fair share of blame for allowing it to get this far. Short of a complete societal/economic breakdown comparable to the fall of the Roman empire, I doubt there will be anything that can change it.
It matters little how enterprising people are when there are millions more enterprising unemployed people than jobs available for them. And few among the unemployed will have enough capital to start their own businesses.
Wow, people actually believe that (re: too much regulation was the problem)? I’d be curious to know which regulations caused our current mess, and which were in place prior to 1929 which contributed to the Great Depression. Unregulated capitalism frequently leads to socially disruptive boom/bust cycles. There are a number of examples of this prior to the Great Depression, in addition to the more recent post-Reagan examples.
It seems we agree that the system is messed up, in terms of the influence of money on policy making, and the revolving door between government and corporations. That hardly implies that therefore all regulations are bad and that we should abandon the idea of regulating things like the financial sector, which seem to require it to avoid messing up the economy every decade or so.
It’s always an uphill battle to enact meaningful well crafted regulation, and maybe it won’t happen in one election cycle, but who knows, stranger things have happened. It sure won’t happen if we all give up, keep quiet, and embrace our role as modern serfs. It’s more likely to happen if a lot of citizens, whether sociology majors or not, agitate for it, and the media spotlight stays on the topic for more than 5 seconds.
As virtually the only conservative I know within the arts/music community, it is remarkable that I haven’t developed a more astute sense of the futility of trying to discuss politics inside that community. But I’m learning.
Yeah, it’s pretty cool what’s been happening recently. I’ve long been tired of the Tea Party people being seen as the only expression of populist anger. I recently watched “Inside Job” and “Capitalism: A Love Story”, after having watched a number of related episodes of “Frontline” before, so it’s pretty topical for me at the moment. It seems clear there’s a lot of justified anger right now. I have to say that as the days pass though, I’m increasingly dismayed that there seems to be no coherent message or discernible demands. Maybe it’s because of confusion due to the complexity of some of the issues. It would be a real shame to waste this opportunity with nothing gained, though. I hope some non-[egotistical self-righteous assholes] involved in this step forward with proposals. For instance, I would like to see, at a minimum:
Campaign finance reform, including:
Opposition to corporate personhood
Opposition to supposed equivalence of free speech & spending $$$
Re-regulation of the financial industry, including:
Prosecution of white collar crimes during the bubble & bust
Breaking up the big banks into smaller entities
Reenacting the Glass-Steagall Act
Regulation or banning of derivatives, credit default swaps, insuring things you don’t own, etc.
Prohibiting the securitization of mortgages
Regulation of hedge funds
Decreasing the amount of leverage banks can use
Reforming bonuses & other incentives given by the financial industry to its employees
Emergency measures relating to the housing crash, including:
Reduction of mortgage principle for struggling homeowners according to a formula designed to remove the local bubblized increase
Permitting foreclosed owners to stay in houses until a new owner wants to move in
Permitting homeless families to stay in vacant properties until a new owner wants to move in
Budget:
Revoke Bush tax cuts for the rich, increase capital gains tax
Additional stimulus in short term, cut budget post-recovery
Abolish pointless debt limit law
A well informed populace:
Break up media monopolies, reinstitute limits on media ownership
Consider reinstating the Fairness Doctrine
Social:
Institute single payer health care system
Providing a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants
Instituting some type of guest worker program
Pet issue/stimulus:
Build a high speed rail network
Optional:
Execution of Larry Summers
In general:
Fighting for the existence of the middle class and supporting the lower class
One idea that just came to me, since our current political system is so corrupted by money, why not set up an alternate/shadow government, have its Congress pass rational laws, then agitate for similar laws? Research who committed crimes, and have its Justice Dept issue arrest warrants. Research who unfairly made out like a bandit, the amount of their ill-gotten gains, and propose they donate said amount to charity or the Federal treasury. Etc.
Potentially there’s a big opportunity for politicians who want to address these problems. Unfortunately, the Republican party is hopelessly enamoured with Reagan style deregulation, tax cuts for the rich, corporate power, etc. So in my mind, the best hope for change within the system would be for progressives galvanized by this movement to contest, and hopefully win, Democratic primaries of US House/Senate races. I’m sure Obama would sign off on a lot of this stuff if they actually made it through Congress. But there also should be pressure put on Obama to publicly support this stuff now, as well as get his Justice Dept in gear and do whatever else can be done solely through executive means.
The protests certainly look like a ramble. But clearly well timed.
Sure we Americans can’t compare our gripes to the Middle Eastern underclasses. But people here who are working hard and saving for retirement in ways that are more and more shaped by the private financial system (ie more 401k’s and less pensions) have been watching for years as their nest eggs shrink.
The growth of the Tea Party, especially considering its rambling nature was a bit of a surprise.
If this movement grows, ramble or not and given the current state of affairs, it shouldn’t come as a surprise at all. Nor should it be pooh pooh’d.
Who wants to work for the crap choices we’re given in our 401k/IRA plans?
Well, Found, there is a government-run pension system JUST FOR YOU! It’s called Social Security. And if I took my social security contributions every month, and bought lottery tickets in Azerbaijan with them, I’d probably come out ahead over what Uncle Sam will give me when I retire. 401Ks have risk, yes, but they also have a return. You can’t really have the latter without the former. Like you I worry a lot about the influence that institutional shareholders have, and also about the excessive volatility recently – 401Ks aren’t perfect. But they do offer the average Joe a chance to share in wealth expansion — assuming there ever is any again…
Social Security isn’t a pension system, it’s a welfare system for senior citizens, which turns out to be a rather good thing when the market crashes and the value of pension plans plunge.
That’s the point though Aging Scenester – they are not offering the average Joe a chance at wealth expansion even while the wealthy take a bigger share.
I don’t think Tea Partiers and this crowd a far apart – and with good reason.
For what it’s worth AS, I thought you made some good points.